


Take Flight, Clipped Wings

by TheDarkFlygon



Series: InaCafé/Inazuma Uni AU [1]
Category: Inazuma Eleven
Genre: Aged-Up Character(s), Angst with a Happy Ending, Child Abandonment, Conflict, Dialogue Heavy, Dysfunctional Family, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Family Drama, Gen, Post-Canon
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-02-13
Updated: 2021-02-13
Packaged: 2021-03-14 00:55:22
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 6,679
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29410839
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/TheDarkFlygon/pseuds/TheDarkFlygon
Summary: It's unusual for him to get two visits on the same day.It's even more unusual for him toeversee his parents.Both somehow happen on the day before his graduation.
Relationships: Tachimukai Yuuki & Tsunami Jousuke
Series: InaCafé/Inazuma Uni AU [1]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1504766
Kudos: 7





	Take Flight, Clipped Wings

**Author's Note:**

> Where do I even begin with this story?  
> Well, to start off, that it's been a long time coming. I knew years ago that I'd end up writing a big-ass showdown of this sort. Plus, I knew as I was making up the setting for InaCafé, my college/coffeeshop AU, that I'd eventually write a sort of backstory for it. This is only a part of it, but hey, it does explain away a lot of little things from other stories in the series.  
> Why did I go this way? It's an even longer story than this long-ass oneshot that got out of hand. It started back in 2015 when I was looking way too deep into Inazuma with a friend and, since then, it grew from some speculation to a full-blown headcanon. You'll discover about it here and probably judge me because I'm one hell of an asshole with a way too imaginative mind, but hey, it's officially out there now. Yeet.  
> I'm almost sorry for this.

He can’t remember the last time he had someone over to the flat, aside from deliverymen and the occasional visit from whomever is trying to sell the entire building whatever product they’ve been tasked with selling from door to door. Their visits never last for long and, before he knows it, the door is closed again and he’s gone back to his merry, silent life.

In fact, it’s been so long that the shrilling sound of the doorbell broke him out of his focus, prompting him to abandon his paperwork right here and there to check who could possibly be visiting him on a weekend in the middle of the afternoon. As far as he remembers, even door-to-door salesmen don’t come at around that hour, and he hasn’t ordered anything lately, so… it’s all a mystery.

He nonetheless gets up from his desk and goes to open the door, fumbling with his keys a little as he does, and gets greeted by one face he hasn’t (physically) seen in a long time and (it’s probably just his imagination going wild) the smell of the sea.

_Tsunami._

His friend seems as cheerful as usual, sporting some light clothes (it’s the middle of March, by the way). They talked over the phone only earlier this week, but at no point did Tsunami ever mention coming over, or even being in Fukuoka (to be fair, most of their talking points were fairly unimportant, as they always are), so he’s a little dumbfounded. Considering the grin on his friend’s face, he must at least look amusing to him.

“Yo! How’s it goin’?”

“Good… Good afternoon, Tsunami. I didn’t expect you to drop by…”

“I didn’t remember you being this tall!” He gives him a tap on the shoulder. “You didn’t grow up while I wasn’t looking, did’cha?”

“W-well, now that you mention it, I think I did get a little taller… Wait, that doesn’t tell me why you’re here!”

“I didn’t tell you?”

“…no? I think I’d have remembered if I had someone over.”

“I’m pretty sure I did text you, though!” Tsunami pulls out his phone, taps on the screen, and suddenly deflates. “Aw, shucks, I forgot to hit ‘send’…”

“That… actually explains a lot.”

Tsunami shakes his head and puts back on a smile.

“Anyway! You mind if I come into your place?”

“Ah, uh, no, make yourself a home…”

He lets Tsunami in, closing the door behind the both of them.

“Please excuse any mess, I didn’t expect anyone over so… You know how it is, there may be some stuff on the floor and—”

“Wait, are those your uni application results?!”

Before he knows it, Tachimukai is rushing to the living room where, sure enough, he left those papers on the table right next to his unfinished math drills. By the time he gets there, however, Tsunami has already started going through them.

“Wait, you got into InaUni’s advanced lit course?! That’s so cool dude!”

He chuckles nervously as a response, his answer already rearing its ugly practical head.

“Y-yeah, I wanted to test how far I could go, and—”

“My bro tried to get into it. Y’know, Tetsu, my bro who’s always top of the class, 100-outta-100 student and all? He told me that course was, like, so hard to get because he tried to get into another like that. That’s awesome you got accepted!”

“I-it’s great, but, huh—”

Oh God, Tsunami’s eyes are _sparkling_.

“We’re gonna attend the same uni too, that’s awesome! Did you find somewhere to live yet?”

“Actually, that’s the issue. I don’t, so… I think I’ll just attend Kurume, I imagine…”

Tsunami stares at him as if he had just said a big no-no, before pulling him right against him. Their size difference is showing, even if Tsunami’s tall amount of wild hair is partly to blame about that.

“You’re not gonna throw away a chance like that for something as minor as that, right?!”

Before he can reply, however, he hears the doorbell ring – again.

The fact it rang even once was weird, but a second visitor really isn’t something he expected to have; so he’s a little weary as Tsunami alleviate his grip on him.

“Wait, you’re having someone over?”

“N-no. I didn’t expect anyone, as usual. I even thought I’d have the chance to finally finish my accounting after my homework. Stay here, I’ll open and tell them I’m busy.”

“Ah, huh, sure, you do you…”

He’s wearier than earlier, because this time it _can’t_ be Tsunami that wants to pay him a visit, and expecting someone like Toda to come is ludicrous at best; yet, since Tsunami is here and he isn’t all on his own, he feels braver than usual and doesn’t even look through the eyelet, instead opening the door directly – only to freeze in his steps, cold sweat pearling down his back, mouth agape.

Are standing in front of the door a tall man with slicked-back (greying) light golden-brown hair, dressed in a suit, and a woman shorter than him with peppered dark brown hair and glasses, standing as sharply as the man. They look both very out of place with their luggage and dressed in grey and black business attires compared to the colourful display of the little residence with questionable plumbing and little (but improving!) sound isolation, as if they got mistaken by their GPS and ended up in a calm district of Fukuoka instead of the big city, like they somehow missed the stop in Tokyo’s business district and are just here to ask him for directions back to civilization (or something – when he was in Tokyo for a match against Raimon a couple years ago, some people sure were speaking like Fukuoka already was a countryside hole). The thing is – their faces are a little familiar, despite how alien they look.

After all, if he isn’t mistaken, they’re all related in _some_ way; but he can’t remember where he’s seen them before…

“Good afternoon, Yuuki,” the woman tells him as the man stays silent.

“Let us come in,” he then adds, neither of them even trying to smile.

Ah, right, he now remembers why he vaguely knows them, something that comes back to him right as he allows them in and closes the door after someone else yet again.

Those guys are his _parents_.

He lets them in, in silence, unable to shake off a sudden anger he hasn’t felt until now. He doesn’t like getting thrusted into situations he can’t have foreseen such as, oh, you know, not being warned ahead his always-absent parents are going to drop by. Still, the anger is only second to a feeling of intrigue (and dread) he can’t shake off: why are they here, without a warning? Why _now_? (He closes the door and, hoping for no more surprise visits, locks it behind him).

It’s the middle of spring and his graduation ceremony is tomorrow, so really, it’s ill timing. He’d rather go back to his paperwork than discuss with them because, really, he has either too much or too little to tell them. In any case, he doesn’t like the vibe he’s getting from the situation, especially since he isn’t home alone (unlike literally every single other moment of the day where he isn’t at school or in the dorms, and even then, he left the dorm on Friday since the year has come to an end…).

Lucky for him, when he finds himself in the living room of the flat with those two adults, Tsunami isn’t there. He can’t have left the plot without being noticed, so he’s probably hiding somewhere, if Yuuki had to guess (thinking of himself with his first name shouldn’t feel so weird, yet it is). Where, he doesn’t know, but he also doesn’t have the time to think about that when –

“Yuuki,” His father turns around, looking even sterner than before. “What are those?”

He doesn’t need to get closer to the papers the man is holding to know the answer to that question.

“They’re my college applications. What’s the issue with them?”

His mother turns around and look at them for a little moment before her own face crinkles and she gives the papers the same glare her husband is currently giving _him_.

“You think about majoring in _literature_?”

“You’re going to attend university in _Tokyo_?”

Welp, their reactions are conflicting to face, because really, he sees no issue with either, and he doesn’t know why they should even care. They didn’t care about the middle school he attended or his choice of high school after that was finished (Tsukimori, while a school reputed for its sports teams, was also remarkable in the field of knowledge in general, and the only reason he even got in was due to his reputation as Yokato’s captain in third year; but he never heard either of them congratulate him for even getting into Tsukimori).

“Well, y-yeah, _and_?”

His mother’s face turns into a pout (it’s probably not a very accurate description, but right now, he can’t be bothered).

“Why would you do so? Can’t you attend university in Fukuoka?”

He wishes he could just pinpoint neither of them studied where they were born (he’s seen their identity papers enough to know his mother is American; talk about studying where she lived her childhood); but he has the feeling it’d only pour oil onto the fire and he really, really doesn’t want to stir up more conflict than he feels incoming.

“The major I want to pursue is only in this one university, and—”

“You’re thinking about majoring in literature. Don’t you think you’d be better off majoring in something _useful_ like _business_?”

The tone of the remark doesn’t please him at all. He understands the concern – his homeroom teacher was the one to tell him literature isn’t the most thriving branch of employment these days – but the tone is… not how someone should express any sort of concern; if concern that is, actually, because he’s starting to wonder why these two people who are kind of strangers to him should be this concerned over his life choices. Don’t they have those busy and bustling professional lives to get back to, or was even that just an excuse all along?

Until now, they didn’t say anything about what he was doing with his life. Okay, to be fair, he did stop telling them about most of it after graduating middle school, but it doesn’t make it sting less: if they actually cared, they’d have been like Tsunami’s or Toda’s parents and asked him about what he wanted to do. If they didn’t care up until the moment they saw where he wanted to be, why would it be different now? Won’t they forget about it as soon as they’re out the door and back to whatever they’re now doing, wherever they’re doing it? Why are they here to begin with?

“Because I… don’t want to?”

“Do you want to be jobless and on the street, Yuuki?” His father continues pounding, almost massacring the papers as he puts them back down.

“Don’t your teachers have spoken with you about your orientation? Surely one of them must have informed you about majors and where they lead. You can’t just pick whatever seems the easiest or funniest to you, Yuuki!”

“Yes, I had this discussion with my homeroom teacher multiple times, so I’m sure I want to go into literature.” He takes a deep breath and decides that he’s off talking with gloves on. “But why is that an issue to you? It’s _my_ life, isn’t it?”

His words send a cold wind between the two adults and him. It’s still difficult to consider them his parents despite the fact he sees his eyes on her face, the same hue of blue, the same round shape. They feel like distant family members to him, despite the fact he’s seen their pictures and identity papers enough to fill paperwork in their stead and have nobody notice it wasn’t actually his legal guardians signing the ordeal. It’s just… not something that’s meant to be, right? He should be happy to see them, but right now, he can only think of them as a _nuisance_.

They don’t seem like they’ll leave anytime soon, however. Their (somewhat voluminous) luggage is sitting in the hallway, they’re inspecting every inch of his application papers, and their feet are firmly planted into the ground. Whatever: he’s a pretty stubborn himself and he won’t let them take him down merely weeks before he enrols into university. They didn’t have a word to say to him up until now, why would that change now?

“You’re our son, Yuuki,” the man replies, his expression still as flat as before. “We are concerned for your future.”

“Oh, really? You are?”

The question is a little more genuine than he’d have expected to come out of his mouth. The optimistic part of him is speaking: he’d rather think he’s been mistaken all those years, that Otonashi’s and Tsunami’s accusations towards their negligence was only a misinterpretation, than think they were right because of what that’d mean.

“One day, you may have to continue what we are doing,” she continues. “We want you to be prepared in case this happens. Our field of work is a dangerous but necessary one, and we wouldn’t renounce to it for anything.”

“Remind me in what you’re working again?”

Again, a genuine question; except this one is going in a more… worrying direction.

“We are both working for a branch of Caduceus USA, Panacea, in important supervising positions. It’d be too complicated to sum it up for you, I believe; but if you enter by the lower ladders like we did and work your way up, it should be clear to you soon enough.”

He’s… never expressed any interest in _any_ of that. What are Caduceus and Panacea, actually? Isn’t Caduceus that very big medical research facility which has been very present in Japan lately? He’s heard about it sometime ago, when some mysterious illness started creeping up in Tokyo, but that was it, and since then, he’s barely heard about Caduceus. In any case, what it’s making clear to him is that he doesn’t really feel interested in working as some sort of supervisor in medical research.

“That’s why you want me to major in business, right?”

“Exactly.”

He looks aside, unsure of how to reply (but very much knowing what his stance is on the matter), for a moment. He just wants them out the door, but if he can squeeze a few answers out of them, he may as well indulge…

“And why do you think I’d be a good fit?”

“You’re our son; it’s your duty to inherit what we’ve built and continue it.”

“…that’s all?” The strangled chuckle that exists his throat is unnatural. “Just because you gave birth to me, you want to force me into a path I don’t see myself in?”

“I don’t like your tone, young man.”

“And I don’t like the idea you know nothing about me!”

The way he speaks is unlike him. He’d usually rather smile at other people, say nice things and spend a nice time overall. He’s been through hardships, and he does genuinely believe his parents want good things for their efforts and for the people who work under them – but they don’t care about him. He’d rather not think that, of course, because who wants to believe their own family doesn’t have any sort of affection for them; but he’s no longer a child and he’s way past the point of knowing what happened to him only intoxicated his blood with wrong ideas and that fear of being left behind he’s never been able to brush away from his thoughts.

He supposes the frustration he’s kept down for so long is now resurging with a burning vengeance, now that he’s this close to taking off on his own and faced with a very physical confirmation of what he feared: having been a burden put off over and over again since the beginning. He has no reason to remain calm or sympathetic when he’s treated like he should just be a dutifully obeying little boy. That’s not what he was raised to be.

Well, to be exact, what he didn’t raise himself to be.

“You know this is wrong, Yuuki,” his mother argues back, even if the sting he sees on her face says she must be conscious of the problem he’s pinpointing against her wish. “Like every parent, we know a lot of things about you.”

You know what? He’s tempted to evaluate to what extent her statement applies. She sounds confident enough for the never-say-die part of himself to give her a chance: maybe she did follow him from abroad and just got the wrong idea because the communication has been bad on both of their ends… (if only the rest of him didn’t doubt that).

“What’s my blood type?”

“O-”, the man replies. “You may have heard be nicknamed the ‘universal donor’ type.”

Well, that’s true, his blood type _is_ O-. He’s actually surprised they know such a thing, considering he’s only known about it since his first trip to the hospital, two years ago.

“What middle school did I attend?”

“Yokato Junior High,” the woman replies. “You were playing for the team in the national tournament too.” He guesses she did receive and perhaps read the mails he’d sometimes send her when he felt too lonely at home during the weekends. There’s that already, he supposes. “You’re still playing it, right?”

“That’s right. You’ve been playing in the nationals all this time.”

“Where did you get that? I… I haven’t played soccer since freshman year.”

The air goes silent and heavier.

“You didn’t tell us,” the man retorts, obviously angry, judging by his voice and face. “We couldn’t have known.”

“You… you really don’t know what happened back then, do you…?”

They stare at each other, in silence, doubtful. They look as lost as he must have when he had nowhere to go to save himself, which really isn’t a good sign, judging from Otonashi’s worry-induced anger back then.

“Yuuki, we are busy people. We cannot remember everything that has happened to you in high school,” she tells him, her frown deepening. By the end of it, they’ll be leaving with faces like tragedy masks.

“You’re… you’re saying this as if that event hadn’t been important,” he struggles to reply anyway.

“Listen, Yuuki. Adults have busier lives than children. What may look important to you is going to be less important to us. We’re busy, so we don’t have the freedom to remember this sort of things, especially years later.”

He’s got no words to the surge of ice-cold water he just got poured on him, so all he does is too silently retain his rage inside his throat and open two buttons of his shirt, lowering the right part of it enough so his shoulder is visible.

“I guess… _that_ wasn’t important to you then… You must have really been busy, huh…”

Truth be told, he didn’t expect their ignorance of him to cut _that_ deep.

“What… What is that?” His mother says with a tear in her voice. A single tear, but hey, that’s emotion towards him that isn’t contempt or a vague attempt at seeming like a good parent (that also comes off as trying to convince oneself of said good parenthood despite not knowing what that even looks like). He’ll take it.

“A surgery scar from two years ago. It’s had the time to fade out a little, but it’s still very visible.” He’s trying to sound as cool as people like Kidou, people who rely on analysis and facts to respond back, rather than listening to his feelings screaming at him to finally snap. “I broke my shoulder during a soccer match in high school. I think the word got around because nobody expected it. Never played soccer after that.”

They say _nothing_. Instead, their reaction is only visual, and it’s to stare at the scar like it’s the ugliest thing they’ve ever seen. If they’ve worked in the medical department, then they should have seen far worse than a fading remnant of stitches and broken bones; but, apparently, they’ve been as far from patients as they’ve been from him.

“We told you, Yuuki,” the man eventually spews out. “We didn’t have the time to see the news about soccer matches in Japan when we were both very busy overseas.”

Something snaps inside of him. He doesn’t know what it is: his patience? His consideration? The last of his hope? In any case, it’s unleashing a feeling like he’s rarely had running down from his mind.

“That’s it? That’s _all_ you have to say? That you didn’t care because you were abroad and soccer doesn’t interest you?”

“It’s not that we don’t care, it’s that—”

“Stop it! Admit it already!”

His breath hitches in his throat, chest and shoulders rising with an out-of-character rage. The last of his patience has been trespassed on long, long ago, he’s now realizing…

“Calm down, young man! This is no way to speak to your parents!”

“As if you had been anything remotely similar to parents!”

“We gave you shelter and food!” The woman is pleading with a face that tries to be emotional but doesn’t manage to break through the plaster of a poker face she’s developed over the years that have gone by since the picture in the master bedroom was taken. “That’s what parents do, don’t they?”

“When were you when I was injured and in dire need of assistance?”

“We were abroad, we couldn’t—”

“When were you when I couldn’t access the funds you mentioned earlier and was sick enough not to know what was real and what wasn’t? When I was so sick I had to be saved by people who didn’t even live in Fukuoka and who just happened to run into me when I was wandering around, hallucinating?”

“What are you—”

“You come back into my life as if you’d always been in there, judging my choices for my life when it’s never interested you, just because you need an heir to whatever legacy you’re trying to build, trying to use me as a prop and nothing else!”

“Stop interrupting us, Yuuki! You—”

His chest shakes as he finally digs up the one question he’s been wondering ever since Otonashi’s face distorted upon realizing what his truth had been for years.

“…how do you explain the fact someone had to _tell me_ I was supposed to have parents caring for me?”

Another silence. They just stare at each other, dead-eyed, wondering how they’re going to escape from the trap he’s finally managed to lie before them. To say it came to this point just to get some answers… it’s scandalous. He can already hear Otonashi swear she’ll take them down from Tokyo.

“I’ve spent so much time alone in this place that I can’t stand it anymore. I’ve lived here because I couldn’t afford to take a part-time job on top of my manager duties for Tsukimori; but I’m realizing I don’t want to stay anymore. I’m tired of waiting for you to notice me and give me a shred of attention, even a word about me. You speak about me as if I was any kid in the neighbourhood, as if I was the woman next door’s kid that just accidentally threw a ball in the window when he was playing with his friends!”

“Yuuki, you’re—”

“I’m not finished! If you don’t want to listen to me, then get out! You’re not the ones who’ve had to take care of this flat for the past decade!”

They continue to stare at him, looking mildly displeased, reminiscent of the way people would stare at you at the supermarket for having put in their basket the last candy bar you kind of wanted to munch on after class. It’s a mild inconvenience. _He’s_ a mild inconvenience.

“You know, you’re right, when you keep telling me what’s important to me probably isn’t important to you. What you see as some tantrum your child is throwing on you is the frustration I’ve pent up over the years. I mean, it makes sense, when you take into consideration that I’ve just been a hassle for you. I’ve come to terms with the facts I was unwanted and got abandoned as a result. You may have given me a roof and money to survive, but no thirteen-year-old should have to make dinner by himself on weekend nights. Just… be honest with me. You didn’t want me and refuse to think you’ve been awful parents.”

He sighs.

“I don’t even think you’re bad people. You’re probably just as busy and passionate about your jobs as you’ve been telling me you were – but that doesn’t make you good parents. And, well… I’m angry at that. I’m angry that, even now, even as I’m right in front of you, you keep brushing me off because I’m just a child that needs attention as if that was just a capricious tantrum. You’ve ignored me for eighteen years and continue to do so. If you didn’t want me around, you should’ve gotten rid of me before I received your last name.”

Then a chuckle, one that doesn’t rhyme with any sort of joy.

“And yet, you ask I respect you as my parents. You’ve never been my parents. I’ve _never_ had parents, only placeholders. I’d rather consider my old dorm’s hall monitors my parents than you. My emergency contacts have been a friend from Okinawa, my dormmate and a girl I met when I was in Raimon. You don’t know I even was in Raimon fighting Aliea alongside the others, right? I’m pretty sure Otonashi would like to have a word with you for what happened last year as an indirect result of you ignoring my existence… Wait. You don’t even know who she is.”

Finally, it’s here: he feels the frown setting in, deep and sharp; most likely looking funny on features that have been described as “babyface” by his teammates ( _Tachi-chan_ , _Tachi-chan_ …).

“And yet, despite everything, you don’t even _allow_ me to be upset about this. You’ve never considered my feelings into the equation and, at this point, I don’t think you ever will. It’s fine by me, if you just admit you didn’t care and stop trying to have the upper hand. I’m not here to win your affection or even attention anymore – I’m too old for that. All I want is that you stop pretending like you ever cared about me and let me move on with my life without trying to persuade me to get into some sort of family business. I’ll attend university in Tokyo even if you don’t like it and I’ll major in whatever _I_ want. Don’t pretend like you have my best interest in mind: you don’t know me, just like I don’t know you. That’s all there is to it.”

The two adults right before him are saying nothing, looking only mildly bothered by it all. They probably didn’t like the direct accusations of neglect and the bunch of other things he told them without an ounce of sympathy. In fact, at this point, he’s wondering if they’ve even been listening because of how little effect his lifelong frustration has been having on them.

“I see,” his mother eventually says, her expression almost not changing, if not for drooping eyebrows. “I figured you wouldn’t want to see us in the first place.” She then turns to her husband. “I had told you, Osamu, that that’d happen. We should’ve booked a hotel first thing.”

However, the man doesn’t take as kindly to all of his criticism.

“He should try to understand our circumstances, Ada,” he replies in an English he probably thinks the kid in the room can’t understand (what he doesn’t know is that, having spent too much time online to fill an ever-growing void, said kid is more than competent enough in a second language).

“You know it’s not about just circumstances. He’s old enough to understand the difference between being a busy person and running away from one’s familial duties.” Finally, emotions on someone’s face – sadness, if he isn’t mistaken, behind her glasses. “We’ve betrayed him, Osamu. Of course he’s feeling hurt that all we’ve tried doing is convince him we were thinking about him when we both know that wasn’t the case.”

Eventually, she turns back to him while her husband continues to scowl, speaking Japanese again. Yuuki doesn’t bother telling her he understood everything and that it feels like removing a band-aid, then immediately pouring alcohol over the wound: it burns but, in the long run, it’ll prove to be the right thing to do. It’s the reaction he expected to have if this very conversation happened someday.

“I don’t expect you to ever forgive us for what we did to you, Yuuki,” she says with what he thinks is _compassion_. “We’ll be taking our leave now, since you’re right, we’re not welcome here. Good luck for what’s to come.”

And, just like that, the adults that should’ve always been here for him leave him behind again, but not before he watches her pull something from her bag and put it next to his college papers. They go in a searing silence, going as soon as they came.

His mother bids him farewell, but his father doesn’t say anything, and Yuuki doesn’t feel much at first. He barely waves them goodbye himself, his mind mostly drifting to whatever she may have left on his table and, mostly, how he managed to get all of that out of his chest without having any of his words backfire despite how sour and bitter they tasted in his mouth when speaking them.

However, what he mostly feels is a sense of emptiness, eating at his heart, like a blackhole in the middle of his ribcage; like he should be feeling something like disappointment or anger, yet feeling none of it, because he’s tired of all of the sentiments he’s had over this situation, like it’d never end, like he’d never get any sense of closure – but there it is, the ending, and he’s too exhausted to even benefit from closing the book.

It’s frustratingly anticlimactic.

He locks the door again and, as soon as that’s done, goes back to sit at the table, where he was before he had to greet these people, and slumps over it. The conversation can’t have lasted more than half an hour, yet he can’t find the motivation to resume his paperwork. Break his focus and he’ll just stare at some paper like it’s ancient characters using even older techniques to encrypt their wise sayings – or something like that. He really is tired of this mess, more so than he expected as soon as he recognized his parents at the door.

His parents, huh… Even now, he has a difficult time accepting he even has those. When he hears literally everyone else speak about their families, they always have at least one nice thing to say – presents, gestures of care, memories of sick days or cuts and bruises being nursed back to health – but him? Oh, he’s got nothing, and he’s always gotten nothing in that department. That’s the sad truth of it all. If only he’d have parents like Tsunami’s, they seem so…

Wait, wasn’t Tsunami here before that whole debacle happened?

Before he can spin around and panic about that thought, someone puts a hand on his shoulder. At first, he jumps because he’s home and there shouldn’t be anyone but him in there, but turning around reveals his other fear to be real: Tsunami is indeed still here and…

“I heard everything,” he says, as if hearing his thoughts. “Sorry for what happened to you, bro.”

While he doesn’t understand why or how exactly, something in his friend’s words breaks the camel’s back and Yuuki finds his eyes watering, lips trembling, taken over by a rush of emotivity he’d have usually tried to repress at least a little.

Before both of them really saw it coming, Tsunami turned his chair around and pulled him against his chest, in an almost rib-crushing hug, and there was nothing he could do except let himself get overwhelmed and cry, now that someone would be hearing his tears and actually listen to him.

This probably wasn’t the turn of events Tsunami expected when he decided to come to Fukuoka for whatever reason – actually, Yuuki can’t even remember why his friend is on a whole other island than either Okinawa or Kanto in the first place, and right now, it’s even harder to remember anything that doesn’t directly sends him into a downward spiral of emotions – but he seems to roll with it, as he’s always done. On the other hand, Yuuki doesn’t know what he did to deserve such a friend, but at this point, looking into it seems like tempting a fate he doesn’t want to be entangled in _again_.

They stay in that position for a while, he’d guess, because all he does for quite some time is crying. It’s only now that the venom created by his father’s emotionless glare, his mother’s misplaced words and half-felt sentiments, the loneliness of it all and the realization that he’s never going to enjoy the same things as the others, the abandonment issues and unresolved trauma he’ll have to work through is seeping through his skin and into his bloodstream, leaving a feeling of searing numbness in its trail.

Tsunami doesn’t seem to mind, since he can feel supportive hands on his back. It’s been a while since either of them has been this emotionally vulnerable to the other like that, since they usually spend their time on the phone telling each other funny stories, to the point the few serious conversations they had about his shoulder injury and what it meant seem more like a hazy dream than a discussion they actually had two years ago. Usually, both of them would rather stay in their little comfort zone of happiness and warmth; but, sometimes, you must traverse the cold waters, don’t you?

When he does pull away and recover his composure, Yuuki is still silent, and Tsunami doesn’t bring anything up either for a moment. All he does, instead, is to side-eye the papers on the desk, before an idea seems to cross his mind and put a smile back on his face. Good old Tsunami, never failing to find positives in an overwhelmingly negative situation…

“So… You said you were gonna go to InaUni no matter what _they_ thought, huh?”

Oh God, he forgot he had said that in his fury. Feels a little awkward now.

“Yeah, I did, but… Man, I didn’t know what I was saying. Not like they’ll care anyway. Guess I’m not getting away from Fukuoka anytime soon…”

The chuckle that escapes his mouth is distorted, wet with the bitterness he can’t keep down. It’s getting comic how sad he’s sounding over people whose faces he’ll forget even sooner than he expected, because there’s no way he’s looking at the couple’s picture in the hallway now.

“These guys were jerks, can’t you just steal money from them? Ain’t like they seem to give half a crap, you could sneak some out for you.”

“Considering I was unable to access said money when I needed it last year, I’m not trusting that plan. Who knows if that doesn’t happen again if they move countries or whatever?”

“Yeah, fair point…”

Tsunami crosses his arms, frustrated, looking up at the ceiling as if it was going to provide him with an answer. Despite how unlikely that very scenario is, it seems to happen in some capacity, since moments after his face lights up. That’s oddly convenient, so maybe the ceiling really is inspiring.

“Dude, I just realized something, I didn’t even get to tell you why I’m here!

“Oh, that’s… That’s true. I still don’t know why you went all the way to Fukuoka in the middle of the week.”

“Well, the first thing was to attend your graduation, since you told me about it – but there was an even bigger reason, and man, that convo convinced me even more of asking you that.”

“I’m flattered you went all this way to my graduation, but I thought you had work and—”

“Hey, let’s talk about that one later, for now I need to ask you something before you do something stupid.”

Tsunami then proceeds to put his hands on his hips, looking fierce and proud.

“Wanna be my flatmate, Tachi?”

In his friend’s eyes, a flame just like in their middle school days, the same that he hasn’t had the chance to see in years – it’s a real proposal, not the joke they’d sometimes throw around during voice calls because sharing a flat seemed more like a fun thing to do during the holidays than anything else.

“You… You’re sure about doing that? I don’t have a stable income or anything, and who knows if I’ll even find a job, and…”

“You’ll find a job there quickly, believe me.” On a more serious note. “I just can’t let yourself waste that opportunity because your parents are jerks when I can do something about it. I at least owe you that.”

Tsunami never moved past the day in high school where he was technically responsible for someone’s big bad shoulder scar. On the other hand, Yuuki is the first to say he didn’t think he had what it takes to become a professional soccer player. That proposal isn’t just to get him out of funding jail: it’s a way for Tsunami to find a redemption he’s been seeking for a long time.

“I don’t know what to say,” he replies, his mind trying to keep his hopes low and his heart swelling with relief fighting. “I’ll have to think it over a little, but…” Oh, who is he trying to fool again? “Actually, never mind that but. I don’t see myself refusing such an offer.”

The grin on his friend’s face is almost brighter than the sun itself as the latter excitedly taps both of his shoulders.

“Then it’s decided, we’re movin’ in together asap!”

Yuuki finds himself finally smiling again. It’s about time he enjoys his day with his best friend rather than sulk about how terrible his parents are.

That’s when another thought crosses his mind.

“Wait, where are you going to spend the night? My graduation is only tomorrow.”

“Well, huh… I thought I’d ask you if I could. Judging by what you said earlier, you need some company.”

And now his usual laugh is back too, so you know, the day isn’t so bad.

“There’s a guest room I’ve used as a makeshift office for a while, at the end of the corridor. I don’t think you want to dust off the master bedroom, that’s gonna take you ages.”

“Oh, nice, I thought I’d be sleeping on the couch like I’m used to! Thanks, Tachi!”

“That’s… just how this flat is set up, though…”

Before he can add anything, he watches Tsunami pick up the bag he left in the hallway (which he didn’t even notice until now) and run to the other end of the hallway, not even bothering to close the door behind him. His friend was right: he needed the company, someone else to make some noise even if he’s busy doing something on his own, to break away from the silence he’s used to hearing in this flat but not in his everyday life.

You know, it sounds good to get away from this city, this lonely life and everything related to people who are now far, far away.


End file.
